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Scientist exposes anti-wind groups as oil-funded, now they want to silence him

(electrek.co)
542 points xbmcuser | 3 comments | 27 Aug 25 06:49 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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testhest ◴[27 Aug 25 10:16 UTC] No.45037600[source]▶
Wind is only useful up to a point, once it gets above 20% of generation capacity ensuing grid stability becomes expensive either through huge price swings or grid level energy storage.
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DrScientist ◴[27 Aug 25 10:31 UTC] No.45037723[source]▶
Sure you need baseload/storage as part of the mix - however where do you get the 20% figure from?

For the past year in the UK the average is ~30% generation from wind. https://grid.iamkate.com/

So seems it's possible. Swings in generation are dealt with via inter-country interconnects, pumped storage and gas turbine generation. Nuclear adds a steady base.

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Moldoteck ◴[27 Aug 25 11:22 UTC] No.45038096[source]▶
The argument was about the cost, UK having highest prices on the continent (depending how you count subsidies for others) but 20% seems too low anyway. Normal plants are still fine at 60% cf
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plantain ◴[27 Aug 25 11:39 UTC] No.45038269{3}[source]▶
The UK has insane prices because of their refusal to do regional pricing to accommodate grid constraints. They'd rather pay wind farms to park their turbines, than to segment their grid pricing (i.e. make energy prices cheaper where there is a surplus of wind generation).

The UK's prices are a political choice due to the mapping of voters over the energy generation distribution.

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1. mnw21cam ◴[27 Aug 25 12:22 UTC] No.45038681{4}[source]▶
We also have this rather unusual energy market where the price for energy is set by the supplier with the highest price necessary to meet demand at any particular time, and all the suppliers get paid that price. Most countries use a system where the suppliers get paid how much it costs for them to generate individually, and the users pay an average of that all.
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2. Moldoteck ◴[27 Aug 25 12:34 UTC] No.45038788[source]▶
No, most countries use the same merit order mechanism like UK. The difference is that in those countries gas peakers are competing with cheaper hydro (nordics), coal(Germany) or nuclear (france). UK nuclear is pretty small, so gas competes only with itself for setting the price.
3. plantain ◴[27 Aug 25 22:05 UTC] No.45045908[source]▶
If you sit down and think hard about it, I'm not sure you'll figure out a better system. It does make sense.